1. Technical Field
The present inventions relate to clients on networks and, more particularly, relate to connectivity between two networks using one or more wireless client devices as bridges.
2. Description of the Related Art
A Wireless Access Point typically serves as a bridge between wireless client devices and a wired network. The client first establishes a connection with the access point using Wi-Fi, Bluetooth or related standards and is then able to communicate with other devices on the same network. Typically this network not only offers connectivity to local area devices, but a path to the wide area network known as the internet. Access points which provide internet connectivity to Wi-Fi clients are also known as hotspots.
A block diagram of a conventional hotspot is shown in FIG. 1. Client devices 100 establish a Wi-Fi connection with hotspot 150 via Wi-Fi links 110. The hotspot is also connected to the internet 120 either by wired link 130 or wireless link 131. The hotspot enables internet connectivity to each client by forwarding data received from Wi-Fi links 110 to internet link 130 or 131 and by forwarding data from internet links 130 or 131 back to the client devices via Wi-Fi links 110.
In some cases, the hotspot may itself be a mobile device such as a smart phone. In this case, the wired link 130 to the internet would not exist and wireless link 131 would typically be in the form of a cellular wireless standard such as 3G, 4G, or a similar standard based on evolved technology. Unfortunately, the data rates offered by cellular wireless standards tend to be relatively slow and inconsistent while coverage may vary widely from one location to another. Even at times when satisfactory coverage does exist, existing hotspots are ineffective at identifying and responding to traffic with varying priorities such as the units of real-time video or audio streams which must be delivered to their destinations in accordance with specific deadlines.
Typically, communications speeds are limited by the throughput of internet link 130 or 131, which is generally slower than the rates achieved over the local wireless network. One way to increase the speed of communication is to establish and combine multiple links between a local network and the internet, such as described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,292,584 (corresponding to EP 1249119) and U.S. Pat. No. 6,577,644 (corresponding to EP 1067746). However, not only is it difficult, or at best inconvenient to create new links to the internet, the objective of achieving efficient utilization on each link is difficult using prior art methods. The loss in efficiency becomes even more serious when attempting to compensate by further increasing the number of links, particularly when the capabilities of each individual link is highly variable, depending on signaling conditions and network congestion.